Personal

Popular Content

This is a call out to all bloggers and blog readers. In the last few years, wikis have become popular as a way for many people to collaborate and share information. Particularly interesting to the genealogy community are genealogy wikis. Two of the most well known are Dick Eastman’s Encyclopedia of Genealogy and FamilySearch’s Research Wiki.

I have done a search on Google for the keywords “genealogy” and “wiki” but I am interested in the sites being used by the genealogy community. That is where you come in. If you use a genealogy wiki, please provide the following:

I’ve got two wiki’s: one is password protected and I use it as a notebook to store misc. information I haven’t been able to place yet. I use a wiki because it’s convenient and I can give researchers who I work with access so we can share notes and complement each other.

The other one is a civil reconstruction of who lived where in the Dutch town of Sint Anna ter Muiden (in Dutch) at http://www.sintannatermuiden.nl. Each house has its own article which describes the owners and the current state of the house. I’ve also included a Google Map (using a plugin) that shows the location.

What I miss is GEDCOM import so I can easily create articles about the people in my genealogy database to link to.

Right now I’m not using any Wiki. Why? Because I am hesitant to put all of my primary documentation and information where someone else can change it. I’ve seen enough errors in my lines to last a lifetime!

I like the idea of Yvette’s in using a password protected Wiki (she didn’t say where it is). At least that way, the person who changes the article has been approved by the original author. That might stop some of the misinformation going around.

I am working on a project similar to Yvonne’s second one which is a resconstruction of Lowville, NY around the turn of the 20the century. This is still a work in progress but I’d appreciate any feedback you may have:

JLikihttp://www.jgen.ws/jliki.html
Creating Your Own Genealogy Wiki
Not intended for online collaboration, but using TiddlyWiki to create a genealogy wiki for sharing with friends and family offline. Instructions and optional plug-ins included.

There is one that is being worked on now, and it is for research help, largely localities, since there are others that will take care of the biographical and surname data part of it. (for surnames and biographies, visit the Wikia one or http://www.biographicalwiki.com/

This one is at http;//wiki.familysearch.org/

Has been up a year or so now. At the main page, type in a locality or a research topic, and you will go to whatever exists there now. You need to register to contribute, but you will do a great service when you do because if you have ever used an LDS research outline, then you know those don’t get updated at all. In fact, this wiki will replace all of that, and they have used those outlines as ‘seed’ material to get much of this off the ground. If you have new information, just add it.

They will also be able to cover more of the world than ever before. So if you kinow something about India, China, African nations, South American nations, etc., your knowledge of where to find records online and elsewhere will be invaluable.

There is an active user group, and you can attend that online via Adobe Connect as well, it meets every Tuesday and there is a link from just about every page over to it.

We now have over 30,000 registered members and over two million collaborative profiles.

WikiTree allows close relatives to private share and grow their tree together in a wiki format, but because our privacy and editing controls are based on individual profiles instead of trees, it also allows for broad-based wiki collaborations. As you go back in history, the profiles become more widely collaborative. Our trees merge into one big tree.

I use a wiki as my workbench for all of my Family history work. I do this because it makes it easier for any one at any time to go on and look at it. As far as people editing stuff, it makes for much better discussion on a topic, and there are many layers that you can do, that only some people can edit and everyone else can only read, or everyone can edit, or you have to approve edits. Also in my work the people who are interested are to scared to start touching the wiki, so they may view it, but they don’t edit it.

It is great because I have a wikipedia style front page so I have a featured person and a “In memory of” section. This makes people think of the connections made.

WIkis are great because you can link everything to everything else. My wiki contains 400 people, and almost 2000 pieces of documentation. This includes photos, documents, audio and even video. I have it set up so you see a persons Name, Date of Birth, place of birth, parents, siblings, spouse and date of marriage, date and place of death and place of burial as well as children – All at a glance.

The best part is that in a story about someone you think “Who is that they are talking about, how are they related and why are they important.” Well the link is right there, go find out.

I find the wiki a great tool, and it is accessable anywhere I have an internet connection.